


So Long and Goodnight

by WhenIShipIShipHard



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Angst, M/M, Oneshot, Soulmate AU, Traveling, i suck at tags um, soulmate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-16
Updated: 2016-08-16
Packaged: 2018-08-09 03:42:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7785400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhenIShipIShipHard/pseuds/WhenIShipIShipHard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gerard's mind was blank. He didn't allow himself to think, because he'd only think of one thing, and he couldn't afford to think about that. Not right now. So he cleared his mind and let his instinct take him to where he knew he had to go. Where? He didn't know. He didn't care. He was on autopilot. </p><p>[•]</p><p>soulmate au where you have a timer on your wrist that counts down the time until your soulmate will die.</p>
            </blockquote>





	So Long and Goodnight

**Author's Note:**

> hey so I thought of this one while writing my previous soulmate au, and I was feeling up for angst today. this idea came from the same tumblr post as the last but I'm no sure whose post it is so if you know then tell me. I hope it's not to confusing with the flashbacks.

Gerard's hands gripped the steering wheel so hard that his knuckles were white. He was going about 25 mph over the speed limit, but he didn't care, it didn't matter, nothing mattered except that he had to _keep going_. Even Mikey knew better than to try to tell him to slow down. His brother was sitting in the passenger seat, probably terrified for his life, but Gerard didn't look over to find out. His eyes were trained on the dark road ahead, occasionally glancing out of the rearview mirror, eyeing the bright headlights of the cars behind him.

It was around 11 pm, and the sky was dark and cloudy so there were no stars to provide any light. Gerard was pretty sure it was a new moon too, because there was no light other than the street lamps and the headlights on all the cars. White and red, white and red.

Meanwhile, Gerard's mind was blank. He didn't allow himself to think, because he'd only think of one thing, and he couldn't afford to think about that. Not right now. So he cleared his mind and let his instinct take him to where he knew he had to go. Where? He didn't know. He didn't care. He was on autopilot.

[•]

_73:6:1:3:5:7:38  
Years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, seconds._

_Those seven numbers had always been on Gerard's wrist, for as long as he could remember. The countdown timer until his soulmate, his other half, the apparent love of his life, would die. According to his mother, they appeared one day when Gerard was four years old. That too, on Halloween. Gerard had always thought that that was a cool birthday._

_Ever since then, they were constantly ticking down like a clock, but silent. When he was younger, and even now sometimes, he would sit there and stare at the stark black numbers quickly change on his smooth, pale skin without leaving a mark, mind wandering. Then he would snap out of it, smile, gently brush a thumb over the letters, and continue with whatever he was doing. It was a constant in his life, something that would always be slowly ticking down no matter where he was._

_Over seventy-three years before his soulmate would die. It was ticking down ever second, but 73 years was a long time, so Gerard wasn't that worried when he was 24 and still soulmate-less. He was sure they'd meet before the clock ticked down to zero. He had 73 years to look, after all._

_Until he didn't._

_July 20. It was July 20. On the morning of July 20, he woke up and rolled out of bed, like always. He brushed his teeth and showered like always. He grabbed milk and cereal from the kitchen of his tiny apartment, like always. He sat there and listened to music as he ate the cereal, just like always._

_And then he happened to glance at his wrist._

_0:0:3:1:4:6:24_

_Gerard choked on his cereal._

_It was a mistake. Something was wrong, his timer was broken. This was not possible._

_Three weeks. His soulmate's death timer did not go from seventy-three years to three weeks overnight. It was a mistake. It had to be a mistake._

_He fumbled for his phone and called the number at the top of his contacts list._

_"Mikey," Gerard gasped as soon as his brother picked up the phone, letting out a sob he didn't know he was holding in._

_"Gerard? What's wrong?!" Mikey sounded scared._

_"Come here please, I- fuck please just come," he moaned, gasping for breath. He felt a full blown panic attack coming._

_"I'm coming, I'll be there in ten. Don't go anywhere, I'm coming," Mikey murmured before hanging up._

_0:0:3:1:4:3:17_

_Gerard didn't know what to do. His breathes were coming short and fast; he was hyperventilating. He was curled into a ball on the kitchen floor. He wasn't sure how exactly he got on the floor, but he didn't question it, he didn't care._

_After what seemed like years, Gerard finally heard the front door open._

_"Gerard, where are you?" Mikey yelled. Gerard couldn't move or speak. So he just waited. He heart Mikey curse before quick footsteps started coming closer to him. After a second, he heard a sharp intake of breathe as the footsteps stop. And then Mikey was there, wrapping his arms around Gerard and was pulling him into his lap. Gerard shuddered and leaned into the contact._

_"Breathe, Gee," Mikey ordered. Gerard tried to comply, but his lungs seemed unwilling to take in the oxygen._

_"Come on, deep breathes. You can do it. In... out... There you go, in... out..."_

_They went on for a couple minutes until Gerard could breathe again._

_"Thank you," he muttered into Miley's shoulder. He didn't want to let go of his brother just yet._

_"What happened?" Mikey asked quietly. Gerard didn't say anything. He showed him his wrist._

_Mikey gasped sharply. "Gee... I'm... I'm so sorry," he murmured, squeezing Gerard tighter for a second._

_"What do I do, Mikey?" Gerard whispered. "I have three weeks to search the entire fucking globe for him."_

_Mikey paused, contemplating. Then he set his jaw. Gerard watched him warily. Then he spoke. "We're gonna go find him."_

[•]

"Gerard?" Mikey asked tentatively about a half hour later.

Gerard made a noise of acknowledgment.

"You've been driving for a while now..."

Gerard knew that Mikey was picking his words very carefully, which he appreciated.

"Do you want to switch? Or stop for food or something? We might need to find another hotel soon, it's getting really late."

Gerard knew he was right. But...

"I have a less than a day, Mikey," Gerard muttered, trying to swallow the lump in his throat. If the timer stayed constant from  
now on, his soulmate would be dead by 3:29 pm tomorrow. Gerard needed to see him, needed to feel the connection, the love, the _rightness_ of it, before his soulmate died. He had to, he needed it more than anything he's ever needed.

"How close do you think we are?" Mikey asked.

Gerard thought about it, feeling the slight pull towards his soulmate, the same pull that led him and his brother across the whole country.

Finally, after a minute, he pulled the car over on the side of the road near a motel.

"About four to five hours," Gerard said dejectedly. He then looked up and caught his brother's gaze. "We leave first thing tomorrow morning, ok?" he pleaded.

Mikey nodded. "Now come on, let's get some rest."

Gerard only hesitated a little before following him to the door of the motel.

[•]

_Neither of them had enough money for a plane ticket. Gerard was still trying to pay off his student loans and land a decent job, and Mikey was still in school, so flying was out of question. Anyways, neither of them had no idea where to go. All they could do now was drive._

_Gerard seemed to have developed some sort of sixth sense; all he had to to was feel out for his soulmate, and then he'd know where to go next. It was confusing at first; leading to more than a few wrong turns, but eventually he got the hang of it until it became second nature._

_They started in LA, where Mikey was going to school and Gerard was trying to land a job as a comic book artist. Gerard didn't know where his soulmate was, he just knew what turns to make and which roads to drive on. He just knew that he was far away. (As they got closer, he was better at determining exactly how far they were.)_

_Hours became days. Days of driving. Days of brief stops at restaurants, motels, and gas stations. Days of endless roads and signs and cars. Mikey and Gerard took turns driving. They switched off every hour, and drove a total of about ten hours a day. Gerard rarely spoke except to direct Mikey. He constantly had a pit of anxiety and dread in his stomach. Mikey never pushed for a conversation._

_About three days into their trip, Gerard looked at Mikey, who was driving. They were somewhere in the middle of the country, probably somewhere in or near Kansas._

_"Thank you," Gerard suddenly said quietly. Mikey jumped a little._

_"For what?" he asked._

_Gerard gestured vaguely to the air around him. "All of it. Getting up and leaving with me. Driving. Dealing with me. Being ok with this. Everything."_

_Mikey smiled. "I'm your brother, dude. If I don't then who will?"_

_"Still. I'm lucky to have you."_

_Mikey was humble about it, but Gerard could tell that he had made his brother happy._

[•]

Gerard glanced at himself in the mirror in the hotel's pristine white-tiled bathroom the next morning. His once-vibrant red hair now hung limp and greasy over his shoulders, and he had huge bags under his tired eyes. He didn't sleep very well last night, he couldn't take his mind off of his soulmate. He had about half a day and then it would all be over. Half a day, and he wasn't even there yet.

Suddenly feeling self conscious, he decided to take a shower and scrub the dirt off of his skin and out of his hair. If he was gonna meet his soulmate today, he had to at least look presentable.

After a long shower, he slipped his most decent pair of clothes on: a blue jacket over a black Misfits shirt, and black skinny jeans. Before they left California, he and Mikey had packed quickly, and Gerard hadn't thought about what he would wear when he did actually meet his soulmate.

When he looked in the mirror again after his shower, he seemed himself presentable enough, even though the bags under his eyes were still there. At least his hair had some color once again. He then stared into his own tired, sad eyes. They looked more brown than green right now, although the color seemed to shift around randomly. He then allowed himself to think of the one thing that he had spent the entire trip trying to not think about: his soulmate. He wondered what they'd be like, even if he was only meeting them hours before death. Gerard was pretty sure they were a guy; he just had a feeling. He wondered what they would look like, talk like, feel like, be like. He let his mind wander, but was suddenly interrupted by a sharp knock on the door.

"Gee, It's 7:30 and we're leaving in thirty minutes, get your ass out of there, I need to shower!" Mikey yelled.

Gerard smiled a little; some things would never change. The was the first real smile in days, even if it was a tiny one.

[•]

_Two more days passed. They were staying at a shitty hotel in Ohio, near the Pennsylvanian border. It would take about another full day of driving and maybe a little more before they would reach their destination. Gerard felt that the destination was somewhere in New Jersey, but they were still too far for him to make a real determination._

_Mikey was asleep, turned with his back facing Gerard. They were sharing a king sized bed at the hotel. Gerard laid on his back and stared at the ceiling, unable to relax. He was exhausted, but he just couldn't get comfortable. He hated hotels and their shitty, lumpy beds with their cold white sheets._

_He must've fallen asleep eventually, because the next thing he knew, light was streaming through the annoyingly thin curtains that covered a giant window on the wall to his left._

_He groaned and sprawled his arms out, flinging the left on the pillow above him and using his right elbow to cover his eyes._

_"Mikey, make the light stop," he whined._

_"Do it yourself," Mikey retorted, and Gerard felt him roll over next to him._

_"Pleassseee."_

_Mikey sighed and the weight on the bed shifted as he got up._

_"Cmon, get up, we gotta go." He grabbed Gerard's left hand pulled, but quickly dropped his wrist as if it were on fire. Gerard heard a sharp breath._

_"What," he asked, annoyed._

_"Gee..." Mikey whispered._

_Gerard uncovered his eyes, and stared at Mikey hard._

_"What's wrong," he asked sharply._

_Mikey didn't move. Gerard sat up and looked at his wrist._

_0:0:0:2:8:23:19_

_"No.." he whispered. "No. No, no, no, no, no, no." His voice grew more frantic with each 'no'._

_"I'm so sorry," Mikey whispered, voice small._

_"This is a bad dream, right?" Gerard looked at Mikey, pleading. It was just a nightmare, it had to be. Any minute now, the real Mikey would shake him awake and they'd be on their way to New Jersey again and Gerard would still have a good two weeks with his soulmate._

_Mikey's face was full of anguish. "It's not a dream, Gerard."_

_Gerard didn't even realize he was crying until a something hot and wet dropped onto his arm. He touched his face in surprise and found it wet._

_Mikey had an arm around him in an instant, and was pulling him into a hug. He gratefully leaned in and sobbed into his younger brother's shoulder._

_Just over two days. That was nothing, two days was nothing. And they still had about another two days of driving. It was hopeless._

[•]

Traffic. They were fucking stuck in traffic.

Gerard was about to have a panic attack on the wheel in the middle of the packed freeway. 

"Gerard! Gee, listen to me, please," Mikey was saying.

Gerard barely hurt him.

"Focus on me. On my voice. I know you can hear me. Please."

Gerard felt a hand on his shoulder and he looked at Mikey.

"Good. Now you're gonna focus on two things. My voice and the road. You hear me?"

Gerard nodded.

"Ok good. You're gonna be ok. The traffic will clear before you know it. Take deep breathes... good. You're gonna be ok, yeah?"

"Yeah," Gerard breathed. He focused on the road. Mikey was still talking to him, and he faded into the background, making a wall of white noise that blocked out other thoughts from his head.

The road was the only thing that mattered.

The traffic delayed them by an hour. It was 2:15, and they still had at least an hour of driving left, if Gerard's internal instinct was accurate.

0:0:0:0:1:14:27

[•]

_Gerard stopped eating, drinking, talking. He was going through every motion. The only reason he was somewhat alive was because Mikey forced him to eat, drink, stop for the night, and sleep. If it wasn't for Mikey, Gerard would've driven straight from Ohio to New Jersey in one go and probably would've gotten himself killed._

_They were closing in on the time of his soulmate's death much faster than Gerard liked. Before he knew it, he had less than 24 hours before his soulmate would be gone. The thought made him sick to his stomach._

_With a sigh, he complied when Mikey forced him to pull over and stop for dinner._

_0:0:0:0:19:4:58_

[•]

Gerard was driving way over the speed limit, frantically trying to find the hospital. He was so fucking close, he could feel it. The streets were fairly empty, the houses were like small boxes lined up on the side of the road, the trees and hills were full of bright green leaves. After living in California for a couple years, he had forgotten what green hills looked like.

Gerard was scanning every sign and every building for anything that would give him any hint as to where his soulmate would be. He was assuming a hospital, but it could be anywhere. Anywhere in this small, barren town. He refused to glance at his wrist. He knew he didn't even have ten minutes left.

And then Mikey yelled, "There!" He was pointing at a tall gray building. A sigh clearly read 'hospital'. Gerard's mouth went dry. He was almost there.

0:0:0:0:0:6:3

He pulled into the parking lot of the hospital and parked in a handicap space as quickly as he could. Usually he would've avoided handicap spots, but at that moment, he couldn't have cared less.

He jumped out of the car, almost pulling a muscle in his leg because of how stiff it was from sitting in the car for hours. As soon as he had both feet firmly planted on the ground, he felt a _pull_ , and with a slight moan, he ran up to the front door of the building, Mikey hard on his heels. They ran into the hospital and was greeted by a smiling woman at the front desk.

"Hi, how can I help you?" she asked sweetly. Gerard didn't hear her. He paused for a moment before feeling the _pull_ again, and within a second, he was off running.

"Excuse me, sir!" the woman yelled, no longer sounding happy. "If you're visiting a patient you need a pass!"

Gerard was long gone. He heard Mikey stutter out an apology before he raced after Gerard. He heard a woman pick up a phone and ask for security. He heard his own pounding footsteps and frantic heartbeat.

0:0:0:0:0:5:36

He passed an elevator and stopped in his tracks, before jabbing the button repeatedly with his finger.

"Hey! Stop right now!" someone yelled from behind him. He turned to see three security guards running up to him and Mikey. He began to jab the button harder.

"Please, please," he whispered. Finally the door sluggishly opened, and the two of them jumped inside. Gerard slapped the close door button and hesitated for a second before hitting the '2' button to go to the second floor. He heard the shouts and steps of the guards coming closer, but the door closed just in time.

He breathed a sigh of relief and met Mikey's eyes. He looked exhilarated.

"Almost there," he said, smiling reassuringly.

Gerard nodded, heart racing.

Their victory was short lived. The hospital had stairs. And the security guards were waiting for them.

0:0:0:0:0:3:13

One grabbed him and two went for Mikey as the door opened.

"NO! Please," he gasped, and struggled against the iron grasp. "Please, my soulmate, I have two minutes please." Tears were streaming down his cheeks. It was hopeless. The grip was too strong.

And then he broke free. Gasping and almost falling, Gerard quickly regained his balance and was off once again.

"Hey!" his guard yelled.

" _Go_ , Gerard!" Mikey screamed.

He was running down a long hallway with an olive green carpet, but the rooms didn't have numbers yet. They were examination rooms, not patient rooms. He turned a corner, nearly crashing into the wall. And there, there were the rooms where the patients were staying. 

0:0:0:0:0:2:23

He was so close, he could feel the tug. He skirted around a gurney, and then a wheelchair. He heard the guards after him still, their footsteps thundering behind him. The room numbers went by before his eyes.

214...215...216

He kept going.

217...219...220

0:0:0:0:0:1:38

Gerard's lungs were going to collapse. A doctor watched him go by, full of confusion as to why a young man with bright red hair and a panicked expression was running down a hallway in a hospital, chased by security guards.

221...222...223

The pull was so strong now that it was literally propelling him down the hallway. Everything seemed to blur into the background, and time went in slow motion. The guards, the doctors, the hallways with ugly green carpet. It all became background noise.

0:0:0:0:0:0:42

224...225...226

226

That was it.

With a cry, he threw the door open and was immediately met with a small white bed with a man in it, several IV tubes, and two older people with distressed expressions, who were now staring at him. In the second that it took for him to absorb all of that information, several things happened at once. Suddenly, there was a searing pain in his chest and he fell to his knees in the doorway, clutching his heart and letting out an anguished cry. He couldn't breathe. He was very aware of the fact that his lungs felt like they were failing him and that he was on the floor in a hospital room, gasping for breath in front of a bunch of strangers.

He removed his left arm from his chest and looked at his wrist.

0:0:0:0:0:0:0

He was too late.

[•]

Frank Iero was twenty years old when he was driving home from college to visit his parents, just about a week ago. A drunk woman in a truck rammed into him on the freeway. His car flipped. Several people were injured. Ever since then, Frank had been in and out of a coma. A few days ago, his condition unexpectedly took a turn for the worse because his lungs had begun to fail.

Frank's parents, the two people who had been beside his bed when Gerard first ran into the hospital room, had told him all of this through many tears and a cup of shitty hospital coffee. They were also the ones who convinced the secure guards to let him and Mikey go when they caught up to him on the floor of room 226. Gerard saw Frank's body after he recovered enough to stand up. Even in death, he was beautiful. Gerard had touched his face with light, gentle fingers, and kissed his unresponsive mouth softly. Just once. Frank's skin was still warm.

**Author's Note:**

> sooo how was that? leave me any comments or criticism pls it means the world to me 
> 
> it was a little too fast paced again in my opinion but 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed or at least felt some feelings :)


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